The Election Commission is going to buy two lakh Electronic Voting Machines for the next national polls, spending more than 10 times what India paid to obtain its EVMs.

An EVM in India costs about Rs 20,000, said an EC official on the condition of anonymity.

When the EC bought 1.5 lakh EVMs from  Bangladesh Machine Tools Factory (BMTF) in 2018, each machine cost Tk 2.3 lakh, the official said.

This time, the outlay is bound to be more due to the appreciation of the dollar, the official pointed out adding that a development project proposal involving Tk 7,500-Tk 8,000 crore was being prepared.

More than four years back, the EC bought the EVMs under a Tk 3,825-crore project.

The base price of an EVM was $2,387 (about Tk 2,26,842 in today's money); another Tk 25,000 had to be paid for its accessories.

Last time, there was no value-added tax on the final price of the EVMs but this time there might be taxes, which would increase the cost further, the official said, adding that the base price would remain the same.

Asked why the Bangladeshi device was more expensive than that of many countries including India, EVM Project Director Syed Raquibul Hasan said, "A Tata car does not cost the same here as in India.

"You can't compare our EVMs with those of any other country. In our EVMs, we have added features like a fingerprint matching system, audit card, polling card, and other safety and security measures. The Indian EVM has no such features.

"If a fingerprint scanner and other accessories were added, what will be the cost of an Indian EVM?" Hasan said.

 Asked why the EC has not floated any national or international tender for the EVMs, which might have yielded competitive bidding, Hasan said, "Only BMTF can provide the specific machine."

BMTF is a commercial plant of the Bangladesh Army. The state-owned enterprise has the capacity to deliver two lakh EVMs ahead of the next general election likely to be held in late December next year or early January 2024, according to Hasan.

The move to buy the additional EVMs comes on the back of the EC's August-23 decision to go for electronic voting in up to 150 constituencies in the polls despite major opposition parties' objection to the use of the devices.

The EC has 1.5 lakh EVMs that can be used in 70-80 constituencies at one go in the next polls.

The development project proposal now being prepared includes the setting up of 10 warehouses in 10 regions, recruiting manpower and training them to handle the devices, and buying vehicles for transporting the EVMs.

The warehouses will have foolproof security, firefighting equipment and temperature control for the proper preservation of the EVMs.

The three-storied warehouses would be on 40 kathas of land with more than 60,000 square feet of space to keep around 45,000 EVMs.

"We will need money to buy or acquire land and to have modern facilities to store the machines," Hasan said. Campaigns would be required to make people aware of the EVM use and dispel misconceptions.

The EC is yet to choose the constituencies where EVMs will be used in the next general election.

"This will be finalised when the election schedule is fixed," said an EC official.

EVMs would mostly be used in the urban seats with smooth transportation and also where the devices were earlier used for different elections, the official added.

EVMs were first used in the 2018 parliamentary election.

Referring to the case filed against Prothom Alo Editor Matiur Rahman and nine others, Jatiya Oikyafront in a statement today called upon the authorities concerned to refrain from efforts to curb freedom of expression and press.

Oikyafront, an alliance of six political parties including the BNP, came up with the remark a day after a Dhaka court issued an arrest warrant against 10 people accused in a case filed over the death of Naimul Abrar Rahat, a student of Dhaka Residential Model College.

Terming the case “motivated”, Oikyafront urged the authorities concerned not to “curb freedom of expression” through the filing of such cases.

“There is no way to separate this case from the attacks -- one after another -- on freedom of expression in the country,” the statement read.

Oikyafront said the arrest warrant was issued even though the legal proceedings could have continued with the issuance of a summon.

Signatories of the statement are Gonoforum President Dr Kamal Hossain, JSD President ASM Abdur Rob, BNP Standing Committee Member Dr Abdul Moin Khan, Nagorik Oikya Convener Mahmudur Rahman Manna, Gonoshasthaya Kendra founder Dr Zafrullah Chowdhury, and Bikalpa Dhara Bangladesh Chairman Prof Nurul Amin Bepary.

ARREST WARRANT ISSUED FOR PUBLISHING TRUTH: FAKHRUL

Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, secretary-general of BNP, today said that there is no freedom of expression in the country as the government is “oppressive”.

“The government is repressing those who are engaged in writing and speaking the truth…” Fakhrul said during a programme at the Jatiya Press Club in the capital.

He said this while referring to the case filed against the editor of Prothom Alo.

“What is the offence of Matiur Rahman? The offence is he wrote something. His newspaper publishes the truth and thus he has been implicated in an unnatural death case,” he said.

AUTHORITIES MUST FOLLOW DUE PROCESS: AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

Bangladesh authorities must ensure that the legal proceedings against 10 people, including the editor of Prothom Alo, follow due process, Amnesty International South Asia said in a Facebook post.

“Authorities must therefore show restraint on any action that can amount to an attack on freedom of expression in the country,” the international rights body said.

Earlier yesterday, 47 noted citizens also issued a joint statement protesting and condemning the filing of the case.

JOURNO BODIES VOICE CONCERN

Bangladesh Federal Union of Journalists (BFUJ) and Dhaka Union of Journalists (DUJ) today in a joint statement also voiced concern over the arrest warrants.

In the statement, BFUJ President Ruhul Amin Gazi, its secretary-general M Abdullah, along with DUJ President Kader Gani Chowdhury and its General Secretary Shahidul Islam, called upon the government to shun the path of repressing, harassing and arresting editors and journalists.

It is heartening to see that the media has been preparing statements based on the information in affidavits submitted by the candidates who are running for parliament. This requirement of submitting affidavits came from a ruling by the high court bench led by Justice Abdul Matin in 2005. The judgement required the candidates running for parliament to submit eight kinds of information with their nomination papers. These include their educational qualifications, criminal records, and assets, income and liabilities of both themselves and their dependents.

The court also directed the Election Commission to disseminate this information so that the people could use it to make informed decisions in casting their votes. The EC, however, failed to disseminate that information. We, on behalf of SHUJAN, have been disseminating this information through the media by preparing comparative statements for each constituency. We also thwarted the sinister efforts by an imposter named Abu Safa who, using false information, tried to overturn the high court judgement.

This idea of disclosure of information about the candidates in the form of affidavits has a history. In 2002, in Union of India vs Association for Democratic Reforms [2002 (3) SCC], the Indian supreme court gave a seminal judgement in which it stated that the right to know about public officials is derived from the constitutional right to freedom of speech and expression.

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Of the AL, for the AL, and by the AL

In a second case, People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) vs Union of India [2003 (4) SCC], the Supreme Court of India further emphasised the importance of disclosure of antecedents. Using this information, the court opined, the voters could decide whether they would vote for A or B. The court further said that if you don't want to turn democracy into a farce, you have to give the voters this right to have information about the background of the candidates. Bangladesh's judgement of 2005 followed these seminal judgments of the Indian supreme court.

There have been numerous efforts in our country to thwart this judgement. For example, in 2013 there were four city corporation elections: Barisal, Khulna, Rajshahi, and Sylhet. In the previous election, held in 2007, the Awami League mayoral candidates won and the BNP candidates lost. The same candidates ran again in 2013. We compared the affidavits submitted by the same candidates in both elections to see what happened to their income and wealth. What we found was that the income and wealth of the incumbent mayors, who were elected in 2007, skyrocketed. And the wealth and income of those who didn't win in 2007 either remained the same or declined. Thus, it became clear that getting elected was like getting an Aladdin's lamp in one's hands. In other words, anyone occupying an elected office is able to mint money and get rich. We held a press conference to disseminate our findings. In response, Awami League sent a letter to the EC saying that we had defamed them using concocted information. This allegation was totally false as we used the information disclosed by candidates in their affidavits sworn before a magistrate. It should be noted that including false information in an affidavit, sworn before a magistrate, is a criminal offence under section 181 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Yet, we were accused of using misinformation with the intention of defaming the candidates.

The biggest attack came from Sayed Ashraful Islam, the general secretary of Awami League. In 2014, according to a Prothom Alo report, he said that the affidavits have become the tools of character assassination of politicians. Clearly, these were efforts to do away with the requirement of disclosing antecedents by candidates in the form of affidavits. But they forgot one extremely important detail. The demand for disclosures came from the Awami League itself. On July 15, 2005, Sheikh Hasina, the then leader of the opposition, said in a press conference that the candidates must submit her/his own and their dependants' wealth information with their nomination papers. Additionally, they would have to declare if they have any personal stake in any economic activities of the government. She also demanded that those who lied or provided misinformation in their affidavit face strict legal consequences. However, this was not the only instance when Awami League reiterated the importance of disclosure of antecedents of powerful individuals including MPs.

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Politicians’ wealth surge and why nations fail

Before the 2008 parliamentary election, Awami League published its famous election manifesto, Dinbodoler Sanad (Charter for Change), in which it promised to regularly disclose the wealth statements of all powerful people in the government. But unfortunately, the ruling party and the government didn't keep their commitment.

The EC has also not been verifying the information submitted by the candidates. There are widespread allegations of concealing or providing concocted information in the affidavits. A recent newspaper report indicates that at least nine of the ministers didn't declare their dependents' wealth in their affidavits. Notwithstanding the hiding of information, the skyrocketing of income and wealth shown in the affidavits of candidates who are running for the upcoming election reflect an obscene display of riches when many citizens are struggling to make ends meet.

One prime example of a candidate hiding information is Barrister Shahjahan Omar, who went to jail as a senior leader of BNP, then got bail to join Awami League and run for the upcoming election with the boat symbol. He appears to have hidden information about his wealth. More seriously, he did not disclose information about the cases under which he was arrested and bailed. For such non-disclosure, his nomination paper should be declared invalid under section 12(3)(b) of The Representation of the People Order, 1972. However, both the returning officer and the EC cleared Barrister Omar's nomination, allowing him to contest in the election to be held on January 7. Here didn't both the returning officer and the EC violate the law in validating Barrister Omar's nomination paper?

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The facade of a competitive election

In the last few decades, a lot of people have become very rich in our country, mostly through illegal means. They are now trying to "buy" political power by becoming MPs using their ill-gotten money. As a result, over two-thirds of our MPs are now businessmen who have been trying to further their interests using government power. Many of them also hide information in their affidavits. Entry of many of these self-interested individuals to our electoral arena could be blocked if the EC would take the requirement of the submission of affidavits seriously and thoroughly scrutinise them. Unfortunately, despite our repeated efforts, we have not been able to convince the EC to scrutinise the affidavits and disqualify those who hide or submit false information in their affidavits. If the commission lacks capacity to scrutinise the affidavits, they can use the help of the Anti-Corruption Commission and the National Bureau of Revenue for this purpose.

The format for the affidavit developed before the 2008 elections has some serious limitations. We updated the format and shared it with the EC, but received no positive response from the commission. We hope the EC will take it seriously and revise the format and apply it vigorously. We urge it to do its part to clean up our electoral arena by turning the halafnama into amalnama for candidates running for office.

Dr Badiul Alam Majumdar is secretary of SHUJAN: Citizens for Good Governance.

Views expressed in this article are the author's own.

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Amidst much confusion as to whether Gonoforum-elect MPs would join sessions of the 11th parliament, Mr Sultan Mansur, the elected MP from Moulvibazar-2 constituency under Gonoforum's banner, finally took his oath as a member of parliament on March 7, 2019.

On the very same day, he was expelled from the party hours after taking oath, on the allegation that he violated his party decision of not joining the parliament. Referring to Article 70 of the Constitution, Attorney-General Advocate Mahbubey Alam commented to the media that the parliamentary membership of Sultan Mansur will stand as he neither resigned from the party nor voted against the party. Moreover, he is the only lawmaker from Gonoforum who has taken oath in parliament.

Professor Dr Ridwanul Hoque of Dhaka University, however, takes a different position and opines that the seat of Mr Mansur has become vacant in the parliament under Article 70. In response to a question by the Law Desk, The Daily Star, Professor Hoque said, "That Mr Mansur's decision to join parliament defying his party decision would not be affected by Article 70 is an interpretation that does not conform to the context and rationale of Article 70. His decision is nothing less than his resignation from the party. The very basis of Article 70 is to prevent horse-trading in the parliament, which has indeed occurred in this case though not in reference to a transaction in the House. The party which nominated Mr Mansur has expelled him, because of which the constitutional source of his being a member of parliament has been swept away. Article 70's scope is much wider than simply what is written under it."    

The rationale of Professor Hoque's statement can be found in the Bangladesh Constituent Assembly Members (Cessation of Membership) Order 1972. Considered as the predecessor document from which came the genesis of Article 70, the 1972 Order in its Article 3(ii) provides that a member of Constituent Assembly was to lose his membership if he was expelled by such political party, and he was to cease to be a member of the Assembly for the unexpired period of his term as such member.

It seems that in the Constitution there is no direct solution to this unique problem. That is why, if Gonoforum appeals to the Speaker for vacating the expelled leader Sultan Mansur's seat in the parliament under Article 70 of the Constitution, it would be a constitutional law issue—first-of-its-kind—in Bangladesh. According to Article 70, membership of a lawmaker will be vacated if he or she resigns from the party or votes in parliament against the party.

Constitutional law jurist Advocate Mahmudul Islam, in his book Constitutional Law of Bangladesh, writes that the term "resign" may have extended meaning. If someone joins the cabinet/ministry formed by one party after being elected on the nomination of another party, this may sometimes constitute resignation from the latter party under the interpretation of Article 70. However, in the case of Sultan Mansur, he has not resigned from the party; rather the party from which he got nomination has expelled him for defying party decision. The question now is: will Sultan Mansur lose his parliamentary membership for defying the party decision?

In this regard, Advocate Mahmudul Islam comments that violation of any direction of the party will not automatically lead to the vacation of a seat. So this would mean that, in the present context, Sultan Mansur will not lose membership in the parliament. The Constitution of Bangladesh rather contemplates the duty of each member to attend the sittings of the parliament and provides for vacation of seat for absence from parliament for a specified number of sitting days as referred to in Article 67(1)(b). Therefore, the interpretation of the constitutional provision does not facilitate a valid direction to refrain from attending the sittings of parliament.

Despite all sorts of interpretations and uncertainties, the unique case of Sultan Mansur's parliamentary membership deserves due course of action as mandated in the Constitution of Bangladesh. In an earlier event, in the seventh parliament, two persons were elected with the ticket of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and they were appointed as ministers by the then ruling Awami League. They did not resign from BNP, but BNP wrote letters to Speaker Humayun Rashid Chowdhury requesting him to publish notification under rule 178 of the Rules of Procedure (RoP) stating that they vacated their seats as members of parliament as their conduct amounts to resignation from BNP. The Speaker refused to publish notification or to refer the matter to the Election Commission (EC). Rather he took the stand that there was no allegation of resignation or voting against BNP and as such there was no dispute to be referred to the EC under Article 66(4) of the Constitution.

Article 66(4) of the Constitution provides that if any dispute arises as to whether a member of parliament has, after his election, become subject to any form of disqualification mentioned in Article 66(2), or as to whether he should vacate his seat in line with Article 70, the dispute shall be referred to the EC to hear it, and the decision of the Commission would be final.

BNP leader Khandaker Delwar Hossain subsequently challenged the ruling of the Speaker in the Supreme Court of Bangladesh. The Court in this case observed that the facts and circumstances of the case disclosed a dispute regarding the alleged resignation of the two members and the EC is the authority designated by the Constitution to determine the question as to what is meant by resignation. Accordingly, the Court directed the Speaker to refer the matter to the EC.

As the experience of the aforesaid case suggests, the fate of Sultan Mansur's parliamentary membership now depends upon the ruling of the Speaker of the parliament who can only refer the case to the EC for a decision. If the case of Sultan Mansur is referred, the EC would be the ultimate authority to make a decision on this matter.

Mohamamd Golam Sarwar and Emraan Azad work for the Law Desk, The Daily Star.

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